Wine, Beer & Spirits

Wine, Waterfalls & Wort

Visit numerous waterfalls, some which you can see without even getting off your bus, in gorge-ous Ithaca, NY. Also visit wineries where you’ll choose from sweet and dry vintages, and a brewery where you will learn how a mash is turned into “wort” which is then fermented and turned into beer. Try a lager, an ale, a wheat beer or stout… We’ll compliment these sites with you choice of other nearby options such as a driving tour of Cornell Plantations award-winning arboretum, browsing in a botanical garden, dining overlooking Cayuga Lake or under an immense mural at a favorite Italian spot, cheese maker tour and more. Stay for a day or two or three or four… Best May through October.

Mason-Dixon Wine Trail

Enjoy scenic south-central PA with stops at three or four of the area’s best wineries along the Mason-Dixon Wine Trail. For lunch choose to include a meal at a winery, or former speakeasy. You may also opt for lunch on own at York’s Central Market or at a Penn-Dutch market with food and craft vendors. One-day tour, year round. Overnight options available.

Mount Nittany Wine Trail

Wine around the beautiful countryside in Central PA tasting at multiple wineries and perhaps a distillery with tour options available. We have a cluster of three quality wineries and a distillery plus more in the surrounding area. Also included is a stop at Tait Farm offering local produce and artisan wares including shrubs which add a special touch to cocktails and perhaps dining at the four-star Nittany Lion Inn on the Penn State Campus or a historic tavern from the 1800s. Make it all about the wine and food or add in a local site or two such as an art museum, sports museum, stamp-collecting headquarters, Penn’s Cavern and/or Boal Mansion & Christopher Columbus Mansion. One-day and multi-day options, year round.

Wine & Garden Tour

Take time to smell the flowers at reknown Sonnenberg Gardens & Mansion featuring nine formal gardens including rose, Italian and Japanese gardens plus ornate 40-room Queen Anne-style mansion built in the 1880s. Dine at historic Belhurst Castle, a stone mansion in the Romaneque Revival style which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. One-day tours can feature a wine tasting at Belhurst Winery and/or at Sonnenberg Garden’s wine tasting bar with overnights exploring additional wine options. For a special treat, plan this trip for mid-June when Sonnenberg’s rose garden with more than 2,500 roses, is in its peak bloom period for a special Roses & Rosé variation! One-day & multi-day options, May to Oct.

Finger Lakes Ale Trail

Visit three or more breweries as you tap into the craft beer craze! Learn about the Reinheitsgebot, the historic German Beer Purity Law that allows only water, yeast, malt and hops to be used when beer was made in the Holy Roman Empire, the difference between lagers and ales, and which you like best! One of the sites you can visit is one of NY State’s first farm breweries specializing in small batch, hand-crafted ales brewed on site with the freshest estate-grown hops and barley harvested just a few miles down the road! One-day and multi-day options, year round.

5 Lakes in 5 Days!

NEW! Finger Lakes Progressive Luncheons

Become an expert overnight!

Tour usually includes wine or spirit tastings at three sites, lunch at a winery, plus chance to learn how cheese is made at one of the original artisan cheese making farms in the region, meet their herd of goats, try their cheeses and take home a personal-size cheese cake to go!